THE BOUQUET

THE BOUQUET
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It was a thursday morning in the month of February. As usual I got up late that day. But thursdays were sacred for me. All deities had a day in their name like wednesdays for Lord Ayyappa, saturdays for Shani to name a few. I liked the Baba of Shirdi and thursday was the day of Him.Offlate His followers have grown and Shirdi has become a busy place.I would become a purified person that day , only allowing good thoughts complimented by good actions. I gazed at my clock to find out that it was already nine.Taking a quick shower, I started to my office. As my brother was in a distant place doing his final yr project , the bike , a blue pulsar , which was in his domain , was at disposal. Skipping the morning breakfast i slipped the keys in my pocket n came down stairs. As I was a novice in driving bikes , my parents were reluctant to let me drive the bike. I somehow managed and reached the office in my pulsar , though keeping the speed strictly in the range of the speedometer to max 20 - 30 .

After the daily routine of checking the mails , i got to my work. At lunch time , somehow i didnt feel like eating as pots of coffe and tea were still undigested in my stomach. My collegues said they were fasting today . On my prodding they said that it was to please Baba. I was hardly impressed with that answer. I thought it to be a weight reducing technique for one and a prayer to remain slim so as to get married.Somehow the thought of fasting irritated me.I always remebered the bashings of my elders saying "Eat to live and not Live to eat". I practised the latter part of the saying.I teased them for this and headed to the canteen.To my aghast I found that the lunch had finished in the canteen.My laziness overtook my hunger at that moment and I decided starve that afternoon.

It was six in the evening when I felt some sort of dizziness in my head.I headed to the canteen and had some snacks , but that would nt satisfy my hunger.By now my dizziness increased and I felt my head spinning like a top . I called my home to say that I would leave the bike at the office premises and take an auto back home. But that idea was rebuked.I had no choice.I somehow managed to take the bike and headed home.

On my way I received a call from my friend who had asked me to arrange for a bouquet to deliver it to his friend's wedding anniversary.I had totally forgot about the fact.The word "Bouquet" entered in my vocabulary in my school days . It was pronounced a "Bokay". I wondered what a strange language is this English and always made a point to pronounce it as bouquet n not bokae in my school days. In all my 23 years of existence in this planet, I never had an oppurtunity to give a Bouquet to anyone . The idea stirred me.

I was hardly in a position to search for a bouquet shop and do all the remaining formalities. My state now was like a hallucinated toddy drinker. Dinosaurs were riding now in my stomach and i could clearly see the stars encircling around my head , as we see them in the cartoons.I hanged up the phone assuring him that I ll do the job for him. Because of this I had to deviate from the usual route I commute to reach home.The bouquet shop was in the main road and the traffic was at its peak level in evening.I mumbled at the situation and marched forward.Control over my bike was lost and I was driving like a raging bull.

The road stretch that leads to the main road takes nearly 10 minutes to cross because of the traffic jam . As I had little experiance in biking, I had to switch on the gears from neutral-one-neutral , in a cyclic order as I found very difficult to control the beast.I recollected the scenes from the movie "The Mummy Returns", where the hero would chop the scores of mummies that throng to him. I wish I had the same power to chop this maddening traffic. I cursed the inventor of bikes for making it so complex to maneuver.Then I remembered the words of my friend who had advised me that "Bikes are made such that we should make them listen to our orders, else they ll order you ". It was right. I concentrated hard on the neutral - first -neutral thing , not taking the hand off my brakes and drove to safety.

At the Bouquet shop
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I parked the beast in front of a mall and began searching for the Bouquet shop. I hardly could see anything and a white layer developed infront of my eyes.It happens when you are starving that your mind gets locked out and u can see nothing. Its called a fused state. I roamed around aimlessly .The street was crowded with computer geeks aspiring to make it big in the industry. They come in and out of the innumerous coaching institutes that have mushroomed in that area , making Ameerpet true to its name - where the rich leave.The scene of the movie Matrix flashed into my mind where Neo gets loaded to a test program , in which he tries to locate the villian.The same way somehow i succeeded to find a bouquet shop.

It was a small shop in the main road, with a few bouquets.There was a lady there. As soon as came in , she approached me.I asked for a bouquet and its price etc. She charged 70 bucks as delivery charges which came down to 50/. I had made an impression that I would buy a very expensiven one. As I called my friend to gimme the details of the delivery location , he stated his budget to 150, which made her face pink. I hanged the phone and said "Okey aunty , pack the one in my budget". Her eyes suddenly bulged and she stormed at me saying that , "Do I look like an aunty ? !! . I apologized to her and addressed her as Sister !!!

This angered her even more. I somehow wanted to finish off the whole deal so that I would head home . Suddenly she thrusted her locket out pointing it towards me and said "Before addressing a person , u shud look at her license". A volcano was building in me now and i felt like I would explode any time. I apologized her profusely and handed over her all the details.She enquired about the details whether the person to receive the bouquet was a male or a female etc.I requested to select the best one in her kitty to give it as a gift After all was done I handed over the advance and left the place as soon as possible.

Today morning I went back to her to enquire whether the delivery was done in time or not. My face had a shining today ! she smiled and answered in affirmative. She could see the split persona in me when compared to yesterday. I thanked her and headed towards the other end of the road to catch an auto to reach my office.

In the auto I remembered that infact she had taught me how to address the people hereafter - "Look at the Licence". ;)

when I opened my mail box , I found this ::

Hi
They've recieved the bokay @ 9am today ... and man ... seems like ur selection was cool ... u got a compliment from them ...

and once again thanx a LOT ...

I thanked the Gods for transporting me from office to home safely on the previous day.

kart